MF GALAXY

Brotherman: Dictator of Discipline is one of the most celebrated indie comics ever to be published in the United States. Brotherman is the creation of two siblings: writer Guy A. Sims and artist-writer Dawud Anyabwile. While Marvel and DC today struggle to sell many of their titles in the low thousands, the original eleven issues of the black-and-white Brotherman comic sold a total of 750,000 copies via indie channels from African-American bookstores to barbershops and Black Expos.

Many credit Brotherman with fueling the growth of African-American comics in the 1990s. Now after a long hiatus, the series is back, not as individual pamphlet comics but in graphic novel form. Brotherman: Revelation – Book One is now out and it’s as engaging and gorgeous as ever—maybe even more now that it’s in full colour as ebook and trade paperback. When I learned the book was out, I just had to contact the artist, since I’d also loved his and his brother’s adaptation of Walter Dean Myers’ novel Monster.

In addition to co-creating Brotherman, Dawud Anyabwile worked for the video game company WanderLust Interactive, and on the television shows The Wild Thornberrys and Rugrats, and at Turner Studios as a designer and storyboard artist for Turner channels Cartoon Network, TNT, TBS, and others. He was nominated for the Will Eisner Best Artist Award, and won a 2016 Glyph Award for Brotherman: Revelation – Book One. And he also won a 2008 Emmy for conceptualising a public service announcement for the Dalai Lama, and in 1992 received the Key to the City of Kansas City, Missouri, for “Outstanding Service to Children” for the original run of Brotherman.

Dawud Anyabwile is also a down-to-earth, friendly, and very informative brother. A major reason I produce MF GALAXY is to support artists in various disciplines, including many who don’t have close to the creative discipline, sales success, and ability of Anyabwile and so need the publicity. And yet when I ask some of them who as yet have accomplished very little to come on the show, some of them turn up their noses. Not Anyabwile! Even though he’s been the subject of countless interviews and even documentaries, and you can find links to some of them on MF GALAXY.org, he was quick to respond, generous with his time, and kind. So, creators of various types, you can learn from this man in many ways.

In today’s episode of MF GALAXY, Dawud Anyabwile and I discuss:

The origins of the groundbreaking indie comic Brotherman How his company Big City Entertainment avoided the 1990s American comics industry crash with stunning indie distribution success, and The artists who were his best allies in launching his business

We spoke by Skype on May 17, 2017. I began by asking Anyabwile to summarise the story of Brotherman: Revelation - Book One, and what he hoped to accomplish with this volume that he hadn’t been able to do before.

DAWUD ANYABWILE, INDIE COMIX ARTIST/CO-CREATOR OF BROTHERMAN, ON BROTHERMAN REVELATION (MF GALAXY 125): THE ORIGINS OF THE GROUNDBREAKING INDIE COMIC; AVOIDING THE 1990s COMICS INDUSTRY CRASH WITH STUNNING INDIE DISTRIBUTION SUCCESS; ARTISTS WHO WERE HIS BEST ALLIES IN LAUNCHING HIS BUSINESS